Saakashvili against return of Stalin monument to Gori

July 31, 2013, 0:10 UTC+3The 6 metre-high Stalin monument was erected in the central square of Gori in 1952

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TBILISI, July 31 (Itar-Tass) - Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili on Tuesday spoke against the “return of the monument to Stalin to Gori.” “I urge the prime minister to reconsider this decision,” the president said at a joint press conference with former Polish Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski. He said that “this is not a decision that will be beneficial for Georgia.”

The monument that was dismantled in June 2010 and removed from Gori’s central square to the outskirts, is planned to be installed by the end of the year in the Joseph Stalin House Museum. The Gori city officials told journalist on Tuesday that the decision to move the monument was made three years ago, but was not been implemented by the former authorities of the country. Recently, the Gori self-government body turned to the country’s Ministry of Culture with a request to return the monument to the city. The request was satisfied.

In October 2012, the collection of signatures with the demand to install the monument to Stalin in the territory of his house museum was launched in Gori (65 kilometres from Tbilisi), the city where Joseph Dzhugashvili-Stalin was born. A number of political organisations and public figures opposed the dismantling of the monument in 2010.

The 6 metre-high Stalin monument was erected in the central square of Gori in 1952.